


Night Terrors

by Fidget



Category: Gackt (Musician) - Fandom, Hyde (Musician) - Fandom
Genre: Comfort, Fluff, M/M, Sappy
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2005-09-11
Updated: 2005-09-11
Packaged: 2018-03-15 13:40:37
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,233
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3449198
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Fidget/pseuds/Fidget
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Gackt is a real person, too, and some of his life story has a basis in truth.  Very, very WAFF little ficlet about bad dreams.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Night Terrors

Hyde awakes to the unmistakable darkness of Gackt's room, the familiar scent providing him with a subconscious indication of where he is. Waking up in the other rock star's house, even in his room, even in his bed... None of these things are new or disconcerting to him. He is as comfortable between Gackt's ostentatiously sensual satin sheets as he is between the soft cotton ones he and Megumi prefer.

Therefore, it was not disorientation or discomfort that pulled him from sleep. He sits up, rolling over to face the gasps, whimpers and soft cries tearing roughly from his bedmate, which unfortunately are not unfamiliar, either.

Reaching up to turn on the soft light above the bed, Hyde examines his agitated partner. Gackt is lying rigidly on the bed, face up, eyes wide and unseeing, darting about the room. His fingers twist together tightly, held close over his heaving chest. He looks utterly terrified. Hyde scoots closer and gently scoops his head and shoulders on to his lap. If Gackt notices being moved, he makes no indication.

Hyde had heard, like every other person exposed to the eccentric idol, Gackt's story of near-drowning, his communication with the dead, and his subsequent institutionalization. He had not given the story much credit; Gackt is all too willing to make up his own life history for effect. It is one of the things which make him the enigma he is. Somehow, he is not a liar... He is a storyteller.

However, after knowing Gackt longer and more closely (more specifically, after having been his lover for some time), Hyde had seen the undeniable glimmer of truth behind what claims to mental instability Gackt held. In the dead of night, not often, but often enough, the usually composed idol would be haunted by phantoms... Awake enough to speak and to move, but responding to stimuli only he could sense. Hyde had been equally as terrified by his behavior the first time he had witnessed it, but upon approaching Gackt with questions the following morning, the taller man had explained, laughing nervously in an attempt to ridicule his own foolishness.

"When I told you about seeing the dead as a child, I was not entirely lying to you. I do sometimes see things which, I have been assured, are not there. I was institutionalized for it when I was young, as I said. The part concerning the Sea of Okinawa was all fabrication, I confess." He looked down nervously, not meeting Hyde's eyes and chuckling a little. Hyde was trying to comprehend this new information regarding an individual so close to him.

"You...you truly 'see the dead,' then?" he asked shakily. Gackt glanced up, and he must have seen the look on Hyde's face, a look that spoke of changed perception. His light-heartedness fell like an ill-supported stage curtain, the soft facade fluttering away to reveal errant emotions out of costume.

"Not precisely. I see... I don't know what to call them. It. I...can't describe what I see. It varies. It is... more horrible every time. Twisting to fill whatever terror will affect me the most immediately."

"But then you wake up and realize it's not real." Hyde said. He was ashamed by much this revelation changed his lover in his eyes, but could not help being rather appalled by such admissions.

Gackt smiled sadly. "Again, not precisely. But they do leave, and I am able, when they are not present, to remind myself that they never actually were."

"What?"

"It is not like a simple dream, Hyde. My memory of it now is as real as the memory of making love to you beforehand. Neither is more dreamlike or real than the other. I only know, logically, that it is not real. Much counseling has ensured that, at least."

Hyde was uncomfortable at least with his weak understanding of the problem. "Why not remind yourself when you see them? Maybe you could cut...it...short, you know? If you could only remember it's just your imagination?"

Gackt looked at him very seriously. "Hyde, imagine that something you've seen time and time again, since childhood, was explained to you as being a hallucination. Imagine the most horrific scene taking place before your very eyes, and the only comfort you possess is someone else's word that it is not real. Would you be able to detach yourself? To quell your emotional response?"

Hyde could see the difficulty, and tried to understand. He tried so hard, and for so long, that when he one day realized that Gackt's occasional episodes in the night no longer frightened him or made him feel that cursed, confused revulsion, he was barely shocked. He only wanted to help to make his lover's terror less.

In the darkness of the bedroom, he stares down at Gackt's horrified face, idly stroking his hair away from his perspiring forehead. He never sees Gackt perspire except when this happens. It makes him seem more real, and allows Hyde the ease of seeing him as a real person suffering real agony, and not merely an idol who suffers from temporary madness. As whatever strengths Gackt was drawing from fail him, and he begins to cry, Hyde thinks, not for the first time, that this is another thing unique only to these nights. He has seen Gackt act as though crying for a movie, seen him act as though crying for real life, but never seen him truly cry except when facing his phantoms.

He cries out for them to leave him alone, and all Hyde can do is hold him, stroke his hair and shoulders comfortingly, and whisper quiet words of support and assurance. He knows better than to try to remind Gackt that his demons don't exist, it either agitates him further or is ignored. Better to let him ride out his fear, which rarely lasts as long as fifteen minutes. Better to be there when he "wakes up."

Hyde murmurs soft things he normally would not say aloud, and even begins to sing a snatch of ballad. Gackt's sobs slowly turn to shuddering breaths, and his eyes cease to glance feverishly at nightmares. He glances up at Hyde with an exhausted, wondering, grateful face, and when Hyde perceives he is being actively watched, he clamps his mouth shut over the quiet notes in embarrassment.

"All right?" He asks the man looking up at him. Gackt shivers, though the room is warm.

"I will be." His fingers reach up to his cheeks, feeling the lingering wetness, and his face falls. "I'm sorry."

"Don't be." Hyde has come a long way. Once, he would have been horrified by such a display, where now he can find no reason for Gackt to be apologetic. "I just want to make sure you're okay."

"I'm fine." Gackt brushes away the trails left by his tears, sitting up slightly to return Hyde's lap to him. As Hyde slides back under the covers beside him, sighing out his exhaustion, Gackt feels an emotion welling up from some deep reservoir inside himself. He pulls Hyde to him until they are spooned against each other. "Thank you." He whispers.

Hyde is obviously half way to falling asleep again. "For what?" He mumbles. Gackt buries his face in the mass of soft, sweet-smelling hair in front of him.

"When you sing...you chase them away."

**Author's Note:**

> This was the first ever GacktxHyde I wrote, republished here mostly so I can remember it myself. However, if you love fluff (and I still do even ten years later), I hope you enjoyed it.


End file.
